Articles Archive

September 30, 2014 When your body (and your wife) finally tell you to throttle back, you had better listen.  Therefore I write this entry from my bed, bored to tears, but still panicked over what must be done in the next few weeks.  The Vann Vocal Institute in Montgomery, Alabama…

July 26, 2014 As I sit in Denver International Airport awaiting my flight to Tokyo and my next work assignment; I am reflecting upon the past four weeks of intense work at Land of Enchantment Opera Institute (LOEOI). There are more summer vocal study programs out there than you can…

May 14, 2014: When I was contacted a year and a half ago about participating in a concert version of Janacek's The Cunning Little Vixen, I told my agent/manager: "Great, no problem; it'll be fun.  Little did I know how much fun it would be...but how much 'work' it would be…

I have been asked on occasion to write a few articles for our trade publication: The AGMAzine.  Below is a copy of the article which has (or will) recently appeared.  This may be a good way to kick off the year 2014...since I have rehearsal later this morning to start…

This article below was excellent. Mr. Reich's appearance last weekend on "This Week with George Stephanopoulos" has proven yet again that his 'broken record, same old, one-note, sour tune' still resonates with tin-ear followers. I have spent 35 years in show business in an attempt to bring joy to a…

A very nice young man who is studying our craft, and starting his career, was given an assignment at school recently.  His charge was to seek out a professional colleague and interview them.  His questions were so good, and his intentions so sincere, that I decided to post the interview…

Now that Labor Day has passed, and many of us in the artistic community have completed summer festival employment and/or vacations; we turn our sights to the main arts season dated 2013/2014...the time expanse that begins in late August/early September 2013 thru April/May 2014.  For most of us, this means…

Yesterday  (July 11 2013), I spent a lovely afternoon at the invitation of the local Wagner Society here in Santa Fe as they paid tribute, via slightly belated birthday party, to a long-time Patron of the Arts.  Edgar Foster Daniels has been supporting the arts (with opera being his particular…

With much media attention, but little celebrated fanfare; the dedicated and hard-working Metropolitan Opera stage crew reportedly disassembled and loaded for transport perhaps the most talked about set in Met history:  "The Machine".  Its 24 articulating half-diamond shaped planks are to be housed in a warehouse somewhere in upstate New…

March 7-10, 2013 will most certainly go down as a transformative and transitional year for the Vann Vocal Institute in Montgomery, Alabama.  As many now know, my connection to the Capital City goes back some 20 years.  Established in 2007 via gift/bequest from the late Roy D. Vann, the Vann…

Winters in the snow belt of Cleveland, Ohio were brutally cold in the 1970’s.  They were endless, withering, and dumped several feet of snow on the ground due to the dreaded “lake-effect” conditions that haunted cities and towns that were perched along the wide, open swath of Lake Erie. At…

On Facebook and Twitter this morning, I posted that second performances are akin to "Low Sunday" in the Catholic Church. That is to say, a letdown compared to all the festivities and poignant lead up to Easter Sunday; or in a way the opening of a new opera production. Now...in…